Vol. 411 No. 7
176 Mr. Ferris asked the Minister for Health if his attention has been drawn to (a) the need for extra resources to health boards to carry out home studies for the purpose of foreign adoptions and (b) the long delays at present due to lack of these resources.
Additional resources have been made available to the health boards this year to enable them to develop child care and family support services, (including adoption services) in accordance with the commitment contained in the Programme for Economic and Social Progress. The deployment of these additional resources is primarily a matter for the health boards having regard to the many competing priorities in the child care area.
During the passage of the Adoption Bill there was agreement on all sides as to the importance of ensuring that people proposing to adopt in a foreign country are properly assessed beforehand. Indeed the Adoption Board, to whom all assessments must be submitted for final approval, has made it clear to the health boards and the adoption societies that the standard of the suitability assessment for a foreign adoption should be equivalent to that applicable in the case of an Irish adoption. It is inevitable therefore that it will take some time for such assessments to be completed. It is my intention that there should be no undue delay in processing applications.
